248: Harmony House & Horror TBR 👻

Synopsis

Jen Noonan’s father thinks a move to Harmony House is the key to salvation, but to everyone who has lived there before, it is a portal to pure horror.

After Jen’s alcoholic mother’s death, her father cracked. He dragged Jen to this dilapidated old manor on the shore of New Jersey to “start their new lives”—but Harmony House is more than just a creepy old estate. It’s got a chilling past—and the more Jen discovers its secrets, the more the house awakens. Strange visions follow Jen wherever she goes, and her father’s already-fragile sanity disintegrates before her eyes. As the forces in the house join together to terrorize Jen, she must find a way to escape the past she didn’t know was haunting her—and the mysterious and terrible power she didn’t realize she had.

The Good

-At the beginning, right away,  the story was interesting

-The dynamics of religion, the girl and her father (and some of the larger conversation you could take about religion)

-Story is not for the aesthetic type of book

-One of the few books that has a guy do horrible behavior and actually follows through instead of normalizing weird/bad behavior

-Story was for the majority of the book entertaining

The Bad

-Had black characters who were supposed to be black but were just white characters painted black

-Set ups that did not follow through

– I have said it in other reviews since last year but talking about issues surface level or with  no deviation does not vibe with me. I think I expect too much from fiction especially with us supposedly being in space of talking about tough issues.

-When I realized that the big reveal has been here all along…there is no other big reveal…everything is obvious…

-then a lot of reveals are not addressed with gravity

Why not put certain reveals earlier and deal with them instead of wasting pages of main character being dumb? (honestly, I was entertained so the flaws bit me later- when we are at the last 50 pages and the main character still in same mind frame, yikes)

-At the end of the story a lot of things felt like they really did not matter: its like why bring xyz up in the first place?

Horror TBR

The Island of Monsters (Spirit Hunters #2) by Ellen Oh

In the House in the Dark of the Woods by Laird Hunt

The Silent Companions  by Laura Purcell

Outer Darkness vol. 1

Bitter Root vol. 1

(image and synopsis are from goodreads)

 

 

253: The Perfect Date

Synopsis

Angel Gomez only wants to get through nursing school and earn enough to support her mother and her son, Jose. Her bartending job helps bring in some extra cash, and the last thing she’s interested in is flirting or men in general.

Caleb “The Duke” Lewis is an up and coming star for the Yankees, known for getting around. However, his last breakup left him distracted and made him turn to drink. When he’s caught by the Yankees manager at a party instead of training, he’s suspended and sent back to the Bronx to get his head straight.

Angel and Duke’s worlds collide one night at the club and sparks fly. Though Angel wants nothing to do with Duke, he has no intention of letting her slip through his fingers. She isn’t star-struck by his fame, and this might be just what he needs to get things in order. He’ll do anything to convince her…even make her an offer she can’t refuse.

The Good

First I would like to thank St. Martins Press and Evelyn Lozada with Holly Lorincz for making it possible for me to win this advanced reader copy of The Perfect Date

Now on to my review🎇🎇🎇

• Feminism does not feel forced or it feels different from how most feminism is handled
• Angel Gomez is not so nice that she does not buck against girls who are mean
• A lot of stuff from beginning is actually addressed as toxic, trash, and etc behavior
• If you wanted Basketball Wives (or black reality tv) drama its here (I think that is what turned off a lot of reviewers since its not usually what is in romance fiction, non-urban fiction anyway, as a person who watches black reality tv I was having fun), also the drama is actually set up so when it happens it means something
• Suffice to say I was entertained
• Mentions consent
• Two messy imperfect people in a romance
• An imperfect hero
• Mentioned: black/brown folks in sports industry, classism, and more

The Bad

• The romance has no chemistry.
• Was everything wrapped up too nicely?

Overall

I want her to write more because I think there is a place for The Perfect Date in the romance genre. I wonder if this is being marketed to the urban fiction crowd? If it is not being marketed to them it needs to be.

(cover and synopsis are from goodreads)

Library Checkout Reviews: Mirage & Girls of Paper and Fire (Spoilers?)

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Mirage

> Culture element and this love of ones culture

> Internalized racism

>Romance was not handled as well as Girls of Paper and Fire because it felt all so inevitable of course she is going to fall in love with guy character of course he likes her back, I wish I got to see the romance really build up (girls of paper and fire had a slow burn romance which is why it probably felt handled better), the romance at times felt like it was in the way of the story because the romance is happening but not a lot else is progressing the story

>Info dump heavy,  a lot of time wasted rehashing instead of doing

>Nothing is happening, low conflict low stakes

sff elements <<< historical fic aka the science fiction elements had low presence in the story  I think the lack of heavy/medium amount of sff did not bother me as much as it did other people probably because I was prepared (by others reviews)

Similarities

< they are not fast paced

I think that their slow pacing is making people not enjoy  them and ignore what they are saying/doing

<Genocide, colonialism, oppression

They do it well and talk about it in ways that others do not

They really encompass the attitude of not only  the marginalized but also the oppressors

<The main characters are kind of plain

 

Girls of Paper And Fire

>Diverse Asian cast

>Fetishization = not a lot of stories even get to slightly mentioning this (which is really messy because there is a large boom of interracial romance in ya)

>Rape= I did not feel the rape scene was done tactlessly,  it was not glamorized or sexualized (imo), It is important to show the rape happening through the main characters point of view (thinking about some recent portrayals of rape) and to show the mind frame of our villain (this was part of a larger subversion happening in the novel)

>Subverts the attractive male who seems mean but has a heart of gold

>Subverts/fixes somethings Wither (and a lot of other stories with a similar premise) messed up

>Sex= (coaching and discussion of it was powerful) it made me want to see more conversation about sex in ya, representation of sex workers/a sex worker, consent

>Romance= female/female, I think people really like the romance because its a slow burn and soft, their relationship is  for them (not for the male gaze) its not hypersexual, the story is the main character discovering her sexuality but its not this hard darkness around the realization and acknowledgment of her feelings

 

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